Ship · step 1 of 3 · for builders shipping an app with a coding agent
Ten gates from Hello World to shipped
THE START GUIDE
A kit for your repository that turns your coding agent into a delivery coach.
Attract mode · a replay of the coach’s own screensREADY
A replay of the coach’s screens on an invented project, one frame at a time. Use the frame buttons to step.
COACH READY — SkillBoss Start Guide v4
KIT .............. installed (start-guide/, checksum verified)
CONTRACT ......... loaded (CONTRACT-CARD.md, 12 rules)
GATE MAP ......... 10 gates, 00-KICKOFF -> 90-SHIP
CREW ............. 9 specialists on call, read-only (crew/CREW.md)
STATE ............ nothing created yet — nothing has been built
AWAITING ......... the magic word
INSERT COIN — say the two words every program says first.
Insert coin
1INSTALL
One paste. Your agent fetches the kit, checks its fingerprint, and stands ready.
2INSERT COIN
Say "Hello World". Ten gates open, one at a time, and none of them opens without your GO.
47 files. Small on purpose. Here is what each one does for you.
-40 pages of plain text. 10 gates: one per step, from first commit to launch day. 10 crew pages: nine specialist agents (architecture, security, data and privacy, tests, DevOps, FinOps, design, go-to-market, first user) and the map of who checks what at each gate. They read and report; they never touch your code. 4 record sheets: your mission, your journal, your scoreboard, and how to use them. 16 guides: the rules your agent follows, the method, the screens it shows you, a worked example, a glossary in English and French. Just text. Open any of it before anything runs, and change what you do not like.
-4 small scripts: 3 git hooks and the one that installs them. Two hooks warn you before the mistakes that hurt most: a secret in a commit, an environment file staged, a broken test suite pushed. The third draws your progress screen after every commit. They are the only things in the kit that can run, and nothing runs until you install them yourself. Ask your agent to read them to you first.
-1 CI file: the same checks in your pipeline on every push, plus a scan of your old commits. Copy it when you are ready.
-2 legal pages: the Apache-2.0 licence and its notice. Use it, change it, share it.
Nothing else. No app to install. No account. No call home. The kit lists its own 47 files, and your agent checks that list before trusting anything.
Drop it into your repository, say the oldest words in programming, and every gate — architecture, security, tests, deploy — locks until it is evidenced and you say GO. Two bills stay in view: what your agent costs, declared gate by gate, and the cap your app needs before it goes live. Three guards ship as real git hooks, so the rules that matter most do not depend on anyone remembering them — and a fourth draws your progress screen: milestones and gates on one picture, redrawn by your own commits, offline, no account.
The crew
You code alone. You do not ship alone.
At every gate, the coach calls in nine specialist agents, each with one job and one checklist. They read and report. They never touch your code. You decide, and nothing moves until you say GO.
ArchitectureYour app stands up and changes without breaking.Owns 10 · consulted on 00, 60
SecurityNo secret leaks, no door left open.Owns 20 · consulted on 05, 90
Data & PrivacyYour users trust you with something.Consulted on 20, 70, 90
TestsWhat matters is proven, not hoped.Owns 40 · consulted on 50
DevOpsOne push, one release, one way back.Owns 50, 60, 70, 80 · consulted on 901 free recipe it can name
FinOpsYou know what your agent costs, and what your app will.Consulted on 20, 70, 902 free recipes it can name
DesignYour user knows what to do on the first screen.Consulted on 00, 90
Go-to-marketYou know who you ship for, and how they will find you.Consulted on 00, 90
First UserSomeone tried it before your users did.Consulted on 00, 90
SkillBoss is built this way.
This site is built by one person and a coding agent. Read-only reviewers check the work: five reviewer agents and a set of review commands. Here is some of what the reviews caught.
A button that passed every test and did nothing in a real browser.two reviewers: “the hero's door navigated to `/demo` and the screen never opened.”
A copy button that left keyboard users stranded.skillboss-architect: “the textarea swapped label and value while the keyboard user stayed on the button.”
A text box that stole the cursor back on every keystroke.skillboss-architect: “a keystroke in the paste box yanked focus back to 11 KB of selected text.”
A sentence that came close to promising safety./design-review: “"your next safe week" brushed the mission's no-secure-claim line (now "quiet week")”
Quoted word for word from this project’s own journal, state/journal.md. Each one was fixed, and the journal says how.
The gate map
00KICKOFFRepository, mission on the record, your milestones, the walking skeleton named.
05AGENT WORKBENCHThe coach installs itself: memory files, rules, three git guards, and the run screen.
10ARCHITECTUREBoring tech, hard boundaries, twelve-factor config, explicit errors, testable seams.
20SECURITYSecrets discipline, deny-by-default routes, validated input, least privilege.
40TESTSPart of done: critical flows named, one command to green, deterministic suite.
50CI/CDCI runs your one command on every push; build once, promote the artifact.
60DOCKERMulti-stage, non-root, pinned bases — waived up front if your stack has none.
70DEPLOYMENTRollback written first, rehearsed deploys, safe migrations, a tested restore.
80OBSERVABILITYHealth contract, structured logs, errors reach a human before users do.
90SHIPThe final boss: evidence review, launch runbook — and the Ship Check at /launch.
The gate ladder: WHITE -> YELLOW -> ORANGE -> GREEN -> BLUE -> BROWN -> BLACK · one colour for each gate you face, never lost
Gate 90 · Ship
The last gate is the Ship Check, in the Launch Bay: ten systems to check the week you ship. Start coached, ship checked.
The Start Guide is a coach, not a certification: its guardrails are heuristic defaults applied by your own agent. It hardens the builder; it never certifies the app.
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Start Guide